


Self

by Fuguestate



Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: AU, AU mashup, Hurt/Comfort, Kinkmeme prompt fill, M/M, Multiverse, Not-Quite Selfcest, Watchmen Kinkmeme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-06-11
Updated: 2009-06-11
Packaged: 2017-10-09 20:55:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/91524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fuguestate/pseuds/Fuguestate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>He wished Dan - his Dan or any of them, really - could be here.  Dan was better at this.  Walter was still awkward with people, and still had a hard time not being on the defensive himself.  But this version of himself would never allow it, so he was on his own.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Self

**Author's Note:**

> An entry in one of the AU mashups on the Watchmen Kinkmeme - [High School AU Walter](http://community.livejournal.com/watchfic_dir/36069.html) meets the GN Canon Rorschach.

It took forever to see behind the weird shifting mask that he'd seen so many times already - this one didn't want to accept that he and the boy were the _same_, that there wasn't anything that would surprise him under it.

But Walter had been wrong - even the zombified version of himself hadn't been this shocking somehow, because even then he knew that man was still Walter inside _somewhere_.   This man just made him think of every beaten-down stray he'd ever seen or heard of - scarred, dirty, dead-eyed; flinching or growling (or both) at any approach. 




He wished Dan - his Dan or _any_ of them, really - could be here.  Dan was better at this.  Walter was still awkward with people, and still had a hard time not being on the defensive himself.  But this version of himself would never allow it, so he was on his own.

His hand reached up to the deep scar in the older man's lip.  The motion earned him an honest-to-god snarl and he realized (_Christ, one of his canine teeth is gone!_) just how fortunate he really was in spite of all the horrible crap that had happened to him before. This was him without _anyone_.  

The tears sprang up without him even noticing. 

"Shh.  Sh.  It's all right."  Something inside him that Dan and Laurie had found and nurtured now reached out to this nightmare vision, making his voice gentler than it had ever been and giving him the courage to stare down the unspoken threats in the other's eyes.  "Please..."

His shaking hand reached up, gentling over a bruised temple.  Muscles twitched under his fingertips, making his other hand mirror the first while his broken words of comfort struggled past the lump in his throat.  The hardened gaze that was level with his own flickered for a fraction of a second, and it was as loud as a sob to Walter. 

_I'm sorry_, he wanted to say, finally understanding that when others said that to him they really _weren't_ being condescending.  Instead he drew close enough (_please let him let me_) to touch his forehead to his now-trembling Doppelganger's.

_More_, he thought, and the only thing he could think to do was give what he himself had been given. 

The stranger's (_me, oh god, he's me_) mouth was clamped shut under his own and Walter's hands could feel his jaw muscles working spasmodically - but he didn't pull away.  Or kill him.  He tried again, and again, as softly as before, not knowing or caring what he was doing anymore. 

He just needed to share something, some little bit of what he was lucky enough to have, and so Walter did what he could to love him.

.


End file.
